Mooo.as a three-legged cow limply made its way through the herd, a crowd of eager onlookers cheered in applause. The venue was the recently held "Livestock, Dairy, Fisheries & Poultry" (LDF) Seminar & Exhibition organised by the Sindh Bureau of Investment (SBI).
The seminar/exhibition that showcased a comprehensive range of technical, business and financial information of Sindhs livestock, dairy & fisheries sector attracted $5 million worth of deals, including the sale of Yamaha boat for fishing, 500 crates for fisheries, and $250-300 thousand worth of contracts won by processed food maker Makka Foods.
Included in the list of participants, were experts, buyers and suppliers from China, Japan, France and also the US, along with some 250 exhibitors. And most importantly, an investment consultative group, comprising of financial institutions as well as various government departments and ministries, was formed that has agreed to meet 8 times a year and take SBIs initiatives forward.
A plethora of various actions need to be taken by the SBI as well as the investment consultative group to get these non-traditional businesses up and running in Sindh. Broadly speaking, however, these can be classified in three main categories.
One is, investor attraction i.e. the efforts should be made to attract large buyers on a flagship basis. These could simply be importers, processors and packers, or LDF farmers - working in specially created clustered zones - the success of which could then be touted to attract further investment.
In order to attract foreign investors and those form local urban centres, however, a smooth value chain system must be in place. And this is the second leg and a more important one because once the right infrastructure is in place, investors would line up automatically.
Ensuring a smooth value chain system would require financial institutions to step up on financing and insurance, whereas the government sector - in partnership with the private sector - must provide for cool chain, transportation, warehousing amidst other infrastructural developments. Moreover, the government should also woo investors through fiscal incentives such as duty free imports of machinery.
The third leg of the project and perhaps the most important are the supporting initiatives on the part of the SBI and the Sindh government at large. These include ensuring smooth law and order environment and safeguarding of property rights - something which interior Sindh isn really famous for.
Other supportive measures that maybe considered include contract farming legislation, the setting up of food standards authority and liaising with the TDAP to increase branding and marketing.
Lastly, but surely the most important element, as advocated by Joachim Westerveld, a dairy solution expert who addressed the LDF seminar, is the capacity building of the rural sector. This development of human capital must be two folds; a) the development of entrepreneurship skills, and b) the vocational expertise of the LDF farming itself.
Yet, despite the unquestionable importance of the need to develop the skill set of these LDF farmers, its quite disturbing to note that the investment consultative group does not include a single institution representing the livestock academia in Pakistan.